Taylor (left): ‘I married my best friend’s dad — and now I’m her stepmum.’Source:Caters News Agency

IT WAS love at first sight.

But when Kern Lehman and Taylor met, it was Kern’s daughter, Amanda, who introduced them. Who was also Taylor’s best friend.

Now Taylor, 27, and Kern, 52, have married, making Taylor not only Amanda’s best friend, but also her stepmum.“I thought he was very handsome,” Taylor, from Phoenix, Arizona, told Caters News Agency. “When we first met, I worked with Kern’s daughter, she was my best friend and he was married at the time. I was also in a relationship.”

Initially, Taylor had some reservations about dating her friend’s father, but she says over time she had “gotten over that”. The couple married in May 2017.

Taylor (from left), Kern and Amanda.Source:Caters News Agency

“At the beginning, my parents were kind of concerned. My mum was upset that this was my friend’s dad, but they know I’ve always dated older men,” she said. Now Amanda and their families approve of their marriage.

Strangers have noticed the couple’s 25-year age difference. When they closed on their new home, the notary told Kern, “Your daughter can fill this out or sign here.”

But that doesn’t seem to bother Taylor, who likens her May-December romance to Hollywood power couple Catherine Zeta-Jones and Michael Douglas, who have a similar age gap.

Taylor and Kern Lehman.Source:Caters News Agency

‘The attraction is more than skin-deep.’Source:Caters News Agency

“[Zeta-Jones is] brunette and he has silver hair, like us, but Kern is way better looking than Michael Douglas,” she said. “People have told us … that we are a very striking couple.”

“But we hit it off. We like the same music and are both old souls. I fell in love with him for his personality — it made him so attractive to me,” she said. “He is fun, outgoing, we both like to party, and he was charming.”

Kern with his new wife (centre) and daughter.Source:Caters News Agency

When it comes to the future, they’ve had to talk about the possibility of Kern dying first.

“We met with a trust and will attorney — it’s something not a lot of mid-20s women have to deal with and it’s pretty hard,” Taylor said. “But who knows what will happen. Tomorrow is never promised. I could go first tomorrow by a freak accident or anything.”

And they have no plans to have children.

“Why would I want to change at that part of his life? Honestly, I love my life. We enjoy the freedom of travelling and having fun together,” she said.

Amanda (right) and her best friend, now stepmum, Taylor.Source:Caters News Agency

And Kern, a retiree, says people shouldn’t judge their age gap.

“If it makes you happy and you click, it’s nobody’s business but yours and if people want to be judgmental, the hell with them,” he said. “Leave them in their glass house.”